Where Does the Legend of Lilith Come From? Where Does the Legend of Lilith Come From? Where Does the Legend of Lilith Come From? Lilith, Adam's First Wife The Yorck Project: 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei. DVD-ROM, 2002. ISBN 3936122202. Distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH./Public Domain By Ariela Pelaia By Ariela Pelaia Updated July 26, 2016. According to Jewish folklore, Lilith was Adam’s first wife. Though she is not mentioned in the Torah , over the centuries she became associated with Adam as a way to explain the fact that there are two contradictory versions of Creation in the book of Genesis. Lilith and the Biblical Story of Creation The biblical book of Genesis contains two contradictory accounts of humanity’s creation. The first account is known as the Priestly version and appears in Genesis 1:26-27.

Here God fashions man and woman simultaneously when the text reads: “So God created mankind in the divine image, male and female God created them.” The second account of Creation is known as the Yahwistic version and is found in Genesis 2. This is the version of Creation that most people are familiar with. God creates Adam, then places him in the Garden of Eden . Not long afterwards, God decides to make a companion for Adam and creates the animals of the land and sky to see if any of them are suitable partners for the man. God brings each animal to Adam, who names it before ultimately deciding that it is not a “suitable helper.” God then causes a deep sleep to fall upon Adam and while the man is sleeping God fashions Eve from his side. When Adam awakes he recognizes Eve as part of himself and accepts her as his companion. Not surprisingly, the ancient rabbis noticed that two contradictory versions of Creation appear in the book of Genesis (which is called Bereisheet in Hebrew).

They solved the discrepancy in two ways: One was to explain that the first version of Creation actually referred to Adam’s first wife, a 'first Eve.' But Adam was displeased with her, so God replaced her with a 'second Eve' that met Adam's needs. Another interpretation is that the Priestly account describes the creation of an androgyne – a creature that was both male and female (Genesis Rabbah 8:1, Leviticus Rabbah 14:1). This creature was then split into a man and a woman in the Yahwistic account. Learn more about this explanation in: What Was the Androgyne? Although the tradition of two wives – two Eves – appears early on, this interpretation of Creation’s timeline was not associated with the character of Lilith until the medieval period, as we shall see in the next section.

Lilith as Adam’s First Wife Scholars are not certain where the character of Lilith comes from, though many believe she was inspired by Sumerian myths about female vampires called “Lillu” or Mesopotamian myths about succubae (female night demons) called “lilin.” Lilith is mentioned four times in the Babylonian Talmud, but it is not until the Alphabet of Ben Sira (c. 800s to 900s) that the character of Lilith is associated with the first version of Creation. In this medieval text, Ben Sira names Lilith as Adam’s first wife and presents a full account of her story. According to the Alphabet of Ben Sira, Lilith was Adam’s first wife but the couple fought all the time. They didn’t see eye-to-eye on matters of sex because Adam always wanted to be on top while Lilith also wanted a turn in the dominant sexual position. When they could not agree, Lilith decided to leave Adam. She uttered God’s name and flew into the air, leaving Adam alone in the Garden of Eden. God sent three angels after her and commanded them to bring her back to her husband by force if she would not come willingly.

But when the angels found her by the Red Sea they were unable to convince her to return and could not force her to obey them. Eventually, a strange deal is struck, wherein Lilith promised not to harm newborn children if they are protected by an amulet with the names of the three angels written on it: “The three angels caught up with her in the [Red] Sea…They seized her and told her: ‘If you agree to come with us, come, and if not, we shall drown you in the sea.’ She answered: ‘Darlings, I know myself that God created me only to afflict babies with fatal disease when they are eight days old; I shall have permission to harm them from their birth to the eighth day and no longer; when it is a male baby; but when it is a female baby, I shall have permission for twelve days.’ The angels would not leave her alone, until she swore by God’s name that wherever she would see them or their names in an amulet, she would not possess the baby [bearing it]. They then left her immediately.

This is [the story of] Lilith who afflicts babies with disease.” (Alphabet of Ben Sira, from "Eve & Adam: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Readings on Genesis and Gender" pg. 204.) The Alphabet of Ben Sira appears to combine legends of female demons with the idea of the 'first Eve.' What results is a story about Lilith, an assertive wife who rebelled against God and husband, was replaced by another woman, and was demonized in Jewish folklore as a dangerous killer of babies. Later legends also characterize her as a beautiful woman who seduces men or copulates with them in their sleep (a succubus), then spawns demon children. According to some accounts, Lilith is the Queen of Demons. References: Kvam, Krisen E. etal. "Eve & Adam: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Readings on Genesis and Gender." Indiana University Press: Bloomington, 1999. Eve and the Identity of Women: 7. Eve & Lilith (The Atkinson Art Gallery, Southport, England) 7.

Eve & Lilith In an effort to explain inconsistencies in the Old Testament, there developed in Jewish literature a complex interpretive system called the midrash which attempts to reconcile biblical contradictions and bring new meaning to the scriptural text. Employing both a philological method and often an ingenious imagination, midrashic writings, which reached their height in the 2nd century CE, influenced later Christian interpretations of the Bible. Inconsistencies in the story of Genesis, especially the two separate accounts of creation, received particular attention. Later, beginning in the 13th century CE, such questions were also taken up in Jewish mystical literature known as the Kabbalah. According to midrashic literature, Adam's first wife was not Eve but a woman named Lilith, who was created in the first Genesis account. Only when Lilith rebelled and abandoned Adam did God create Eve, in the second account, as a replacement. In an important 13th century Kabbalah text, the Sefer ha-Zohar ("The Book of Splendour") written by the Spaniard Moses de Leon (c.

1240-1305), it is explained that: At the same time Jehovah created Adam, he created a woman, Lilith, who like Adam was taken from the earth. She was given to Adam as his wife. But there was a dispute between them about a matter that when it came before the judges had to be discussed behind closed doors. She spoke the unspeakable name of Jehovah and vanished. In the Alpha Betha of Ben Sira (Alphabetum Siracidis, or Sepher Ben Sira), an anonymous collection of midrashic proverbs probably compiled in the 11th century C.E., it is explained more explicitly that the conflict arose because Adam, as a way of asserting his authority over Lilith, insisted that she lie beneath him during sexual intercourse (23 A-B). Lilith, however, considering herself to be Adam's equal, refused, and after pronouncing the Ineffable Name (i.e. the magic name of God) flew off into the air. Adam, distraught and no doubt also angered by her insolent behaviour, wanted her back.

On Adam's request, God sent three angels, named Senoy, Sansenoy, and Semangelof, who found her in the Red Sea. Despite the threat from the three angels that if she didn't return to Adam one hundred of her sons would die every day, she refused, claiming that she was created expressly to harm newborn infants. However, she did swear that she would not harm any infant wearing an amulet with the images and/or names of the three angels on it. At this point, the legend of Lilith as the "first Eve" merges with the earlier legend of Sumero-Babylonian origin, dating from around 3,500 BCE, of Lilith as a winged female demon who kills infants and endangers women in childbirth. In this role, she was one of several mazakim or "harmful spirits" known from incantation formulas preserved in Assyrian, Hebrew, and Canaanite inscriptions intended to protect against them. As a female demon, she is closely related to Lamashtu whose evilness included killing children, drinking the blood of men, and eating their flesh. Lamashtu also caused pregnant women to miscarry, disturbed sleep and brought nightmares.

In turn, Lamashtu is like another demonized female called Lamia, a Libyan serpent goddess, whose name is probably a Greek variant of Lamashtu. Like Lamashtu, Lamia also killed children. In the guise of a beautiful woman, she also seduced young men. In the Latin Vulgate Bible, Lamia is given as the translation of the Hebrew Lilith (and in other translations it is given as "screech owl" and "night monster"). It needs to be remembered that these demonic "women" are essentially personifications of unseen forces invented to account for otherwise inexplicable events and phenomena which occur in the real world. Lilith, Lamashtu, Lamia and other female demons like them are all associated with the death of children and especially with the death of newborn infants. It may be easily imagined that they were held accountable for such things as Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS, also called crib death, or cot death) where an apparently healthy infant dies for no obvious reason. Cot death occurs almost always during sleep at night and is the most common cause of death of infants. Its cause still remains unknown.

By inventing evil spirits like Lilith, Lamashtu, and Lamia, parents were not only able to identify the enemy but also to know what they had to guard against. Amulets with the names of the three angels were intended to protect against the power of Lilith. Lilith also personified licentiousness and lust. In the Christian Middle Ages she, or her female offspring, the lilim, became identified with succubae (the female counterparts of incubi) who would copulate with men in their sleep, causing them to have nocturnal emissions or "wet dreams." Again, Lilith and her kind serve as a way of accounting for an otherwise inexplicable phenomenon among men. Today, 85 percent of all men experience "wet dreams" (the ejaculation of sperm while asleep) at some time in their lives, mostly during their teens and twenties and as often as once a month. In the Middle Ages, celibate monks would attempt to guard against these nocturnal visits by the lilith/succubus by sleeping with their hands crossed over their genitals and holding a crucifix.

Through the literature of the Kabbalah, Lilith became fixed in Jewish demonology where her primary role is that of strangler of children and a seducer of men. The Kabbalah further enhanced her demonic character by making her the partner of Samael (i.e. Satan) and queen of the realm of the forces of evil. In this guise, she appears as the antagonistic negative counterpart of the Shekhinah ("Divine Presence"), the mother of the House of Israel. The Zohar repeatedly contrasts Lilith the unholy whorish woman with the Shekhinah as the holy, noble, and capable woman. In much the same way, Eve the disobedient, lustful sinner is contrasted with the obedient and holy Virgin Mary in Christian literature. Through her couplings with the devil (or with Adam, as his succubus), Lilith gave birth to one hundred demonic children a day (the one hundred children threatened with death by the three angels). In this way, Lilith was held responsible for populating the world with evil. If you ask how Lilith herself, the first wife of Adam, became evil, the answer lies in her insubordination to her husband Adam.

It is her independence from Adam, her position beyond the control of a male, that makes her "evil." She is disobedient and like Eve, and indeed all women who are willful, she is perceived as posing a constant threat to the divinely ordered state of affairs defined by men. Lilith is represented as a powerfully sexual woman against whom men and babies felt they had few defenses and, except for a few amulets, little protection. Much more so than Eve, Lilith is the personification female sexuality. Her legend serves to demonstrate how, when unchecked, female sexuality is disruptive and destructive. Lilith highlights how women, beginning with Eve, use their sexuality to seduce men. She provides thereby a necessary sexual dimension, which is otherwise lacking, to the Genesis story which, when read in literal terms, portrays Eve not as some wicked femme fatale but as a naive and largely sexless fool. Only as a Lilith-like character could Eve be seen as a calculating, evil, seductress. Lilith is referred to only once in the Old Testament.

In the Darby translation of Isaiah 34:14 the original Hebrew word is rendered as "lilith"; according to Isaiah, when God's vengeance has turned the land into a wilderness, "there shall the beasts of the desert meet with the jackals, and the wild goat shall cry to his fellow; the lilith also shall settle there, and find for herself a place of rest." The same word is translated elsewhere, however, as "screech owl, "night creatures," "night monsters," and "night hag." Although it has been suggested that the association with night stems from a similarity between the Sumero-Babylonian demon Lilitu and the Hebrew word laylah meaning "night," Lilith nonetheless seems to have been otherwise associated with darkness and night as a time of fear, vulnerability, and evil. In her demonized form, Lilith is a frightening and threatening creature. Much more so than Eve, she personifies the real (sexual) power women exercise over men. She represents the deeper, darker fear men have of women and female sexuality.

Inasmuch as female sexuality, as a result of this fear, has been repressed and subjected to the severest controls in Western patriarchal society, so too has the figure of Lilith been kept hidden. However, she lurks as a powerful unidentified presence, an unspoken name, in the minds of biblical commentators for whom Eve and Lilith become inextricably intertwined and blended into one person. Importantly, it is this Eve/Lilith amalgam which is used to identify women as the true source of evil in the world. In the Apocryphal Testament of Reuben (one of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, ostensibly the twelve sons of Jacob), for example, it is explained that: Women are evil, my children: because they have no power or strength to stand up against man, they use wiles and try to ensnare him by their charms; and man, whom woman cannot subdue by strength, she subdues by guile. (Testament of Reuben: V, 1-2, 5) References to Lilith in the Talmud describe her as a night demon with long hair (B.

Erubin 100b) and as having a human likeness but with wings (B. Nidda 24b). In Rabbi Isaac ben Jacob ha-Kohen's "Treatise on the Emanations on the Left," written in Spain in the 13th century, she is described as having the form of a beautiful woman from her head to her waist, and "burning fire" from her waist down. Elsewhere, Rabbi Isaac equates her with the primordial serpent Leviathan. Crudely drawn images of Lilith can be seen on amulets (see Magical or Prophylactic images of Lilith in incantation bowls and on amulets). Lilith? Babylonian terra-cotta relief, c. 2000 BCE (Collection of Colonel James Colville) A Babylonian terra-cotta relief dated to around 2000 BCE in the collection of Colonel Norman Corville has been identified as a representation of Lilith (the identification has been questioned by a number of scholars). The relief shows a nude woman with wings and a bird's taloned feet.

She wears a hat composed of four pairs of horns and holds in each upraised hand a combined ring and rod (similar to an Egyptian shen ring amulet). She stands on two reclining lions and is flanked by owls. Despite the fact that she is not officially recognized in the Christian tradition, in the Late Middle Ages she is occasionally identified with the serpent in Genesis 3 and shown accordingly with a woman's head and torso. For example, the bare-breasted woman with a snake's lower parts posed seductively in the branches of the tree between Adam and Eve in the scene of the temptation carved into the base of the trumeau in the left doorway of the West façade of the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris has been identified as Lilith. Adam, Lilith, and Eve Adam's first wife ? | the Pastors eye 3/16/12 at 10:38 PM 7 Comments Adam's first wife ? How do we know adam had a wife before Ev Does the bible tells us so? Genesis 1;27 says So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. So who was Adams first wife.

Her name was Lilith . the Jewish story of Lilith has its roots in the anonymous medieval document The Alphabet of Ben-Sira, some interpret the Bible's mention of the wife of Adam in the first creation story (Gen. 1) to refer to Lilith and the Bible's mention of the wife of Adam in the second creation story (Gen. 2) to refer to Eve. Such an interpretation is unsupported by Jewish rabbinic tradition, and can be considered an instance of eisegesis (i.e., reading into Scripture what one wishes to find). The story of Lilith originally comes from Mesopatamian mythology, in which she is a night demon believed to prey upon children. As the story later became incorporated into Jewish legend, Lilith became the runaway wife of Adam who vowed revenge upon the descendants of Adam and Eve. Out of pious superstition, some Jews, past and present, put amulets around the necks of their children to protect the children from Lilith's murderous designs. Because legend holds that Lilith refused to be subservient to Adam, she has been adopted by some Jewish feminists as a heroine of religious egalitarianism in modern Judaism.

In another version of the myth of Lilith, she was Adam's first wife before Eve. Adam married her because he became tired of coupling with animals, a common Middle-Eastern herdsmen practice, though the Old Testament declared it a sin (Deuteronomy 27:21). Adam tried to make Lilith lie beneath him during sexual intercourse. Lilith would not meet this demand of male dominance. She cursed Adam and hurried to her home by the Red Sea. Chapter 10: Adam's Helpmeets (Excerpt from The Hebrew Myths by Robert Graves and Raphael Patai (New York: Doubleday, 1964), pp 65-69.) (a) Having decided to give Adam a helpmeet lest he should be alone of his kind, God put him into a deep sleep, removed one of his ribs, formed it into a woman, and closed up the wound, Adam awoke and said: 'This being shall be named "Woman", because she has been taken out o f man. A man and a woman shall be one flesh.' The title he gave her was Eve, 'the Mother of All Living''.

[1] (b) Some say that God created man and woman in His own image on the Sixth Day, giving them charge over the world; [2] but that Eve did not yet exist. Now, God had set Adam to name every beast, bird and other living thing. When they passed before him in pairs, male and female, Adam-being already like a twenty-year-old man-felt jealous of their loves, and though he tried coupling with each female in turn, found no satisfaction in the act. He therefore cried: 'Every creature but I has a proper matel', and prayed God would remedy this injustice. [3] (c) God then formed Lilith, the first woman, just as He had formed Adam, except that He used filth and sediment instead of pure dust. From Adam's union with this demoness, and with another like her named Naamah, Tubal Cain's sister, sprang Asmodeus and innumerable demons that still plague mankind. Many generations later, Lilith and Naamah came to Solomon's judgement seat, disguised as harlots of Jerusalem'.

[4] (d) Adam and Lilith never found peace together; for when he wished to lie with her, she took offence at the recumbent posture he demanded. 'Why must I lie beneath you?' she asked. 'I also was made from dust, and am therefore your equal.' Because Adam tried to compel her obedience by force, Lilith, in a rage, uttered the magic name of God, rose into the air and left him. Adam complained to God: 'I have been deserted by my helpmeet' God at once sent the angels Senoy, Sansenoy and Semangelof to fetch Lilith back. They found her beside the Red Sea, a region abounding in lascivious demons, to whom she bore lilim at the rate of more than one hundred a day. 'Return to Adam without delay,' the angels said, 'or we will drown you!' Lilith asked: 'How can I return to Adam and live like an honest housewife, after my stay beside the Red Sea?? 'It will be death to refuse!' they answered.

'How can I die,' Lilith asked again, 'when God has ordered me to take charge of all newborn children: boys up to the eighth day of life, that of circumcision; girls up to the twentieth day. None the less, if ever I see your three names or likenesses displayed in an amulet above a newborn child, I promise to spare it.' To this they agreed; but God punished Lilith by making one hundred of her demon children perish daily; [5] and if she could not destroy a human infant, because of the angelic amulet, she would spitefully turn against her own. [6] (e) Some say that Lilith ruled as queen in Zmargad, and again in Sheba; and was the demoness who destroyed job's sons. [7] Yet she escaped the curse of death which overtook Adam, since they had parted long before the Fall. Lilith and Naamah not only strangle infants but also seduce dreaming men, any one of whom, sleeping alone, may become their victim.

[8] (f) Undismayed by His failure to give Adam a suitable helpmeet, God tried again, and let him watch while he built up a woman's anatomy: using bones, tissues, muscles, blood and glandular secretions, then covering the whole with skin and adding tufts of hair in places. The sight caused Adam such disgust that even when this woman, the First Eve, stood there in her full beauty, he felt an invincible repugnance. God knew that He had failed once more, and took the First Eve away. Where she went, nobody knows for certain. [9] (g) God tried a third time, and acted more circumspectly. Having taken a rib from Adam's side in his sleep, He formed it into a woman; then plaited her hair and adorned her, like a bride, with twenty-four pieces of jewellery, before waking him. Adam was entranced. [10] (h) Some say that God created Eve not from Adam's rib, but from a tail ending in a sting which had been part of his body. God cut this off, and the stump-now a useless coccyx-is still carried by Adam's descendants.

[11] (i) Others say that God's original thought had been to create two human beings, male and female; but instead He designed a single one with a male face looking forward, and a female face looking back. Again He changed His mind, removed Adam's backward-looking face, and built a woman's body for it. [12] (j) Still others hold that Adam was originally created as an androgyne of male and female bodies joined back to back. Since this posture made locomotion difficult, and conversation awkward, God divided the androgyne and gave each half a new rear. These separate beings He placed in Eden, forbidding them to couple. [13] Or maybe this is what happened to Lilith ,A female demon of the night who supposedly flies around searching for newborn children either to kidnap or strangle them. Also, she sleeps with men to seduce them into propagating demon sons. Legends told about Lilith are ancient. The rabbinical myths of Lilith being Adam's first wife seem to relate to the Sumero-Babylonian Goddess Belit-ili, or Belili.

To the Canaanites, Lilith was Baalat, the "Divine Lady." On a tablet from Ur, ca. 2000 BCE, she was addressed as Lillake. There is only one verse in the Hebrew Bible, Isaiah 34:14, that may be a reference to Lilith. The desert creatures will meet with the wolves, The hairy goat also will cry to its kind; Yes, the night monster will settle there And will find herself a resting place. So depending on what you believe Could Adam have had a first wife that was removed from the Bible for various reasons. Or like the article suggests did God change his mind . Your thoughts? Lilith in the Torah, Talmud and Midrash Lilith in the Torah, Talmud and Midrash Lilith in the Torah, Talmud and Midrash The Legend of Lilith, Adam's First Wife (Part 1) Delaware Art Museum/Wikimedia Commons By Ariela Pelaia Updated July 27, 2016. According to Jewish mythology, Lilith was Adam’s wife before Eve.

Over the centuries she also became known as a succubus demon who copulated with men during their sleep and strangled newborn babies. In recent years the feminist movement has reclaimed her character by re-interpreting the patriarchal texts that portray her as a dangerous female demon in a more positive light. This article discusses the character of Lilith in the Bible, Talmud and Midrash. For information about Lilith in Medieval and feminist writings visit: Lilith, from the Medieval Period to Modern Feminist Texts . Lilith in the Bible The legend of Lilith has its roots in the biblical book of Genesis, where two contradictory versions of Creation eventually led to the concept of a “first Eve.” The first Creation account appears in Genesis 1 and describes the simultaneous creation of both male and female human beings after all of the plants and animals have already been placed in the Garden of Eden. In this version man and woman are portrayed as equals and are both the pinnacle of God’s Creation. The second Creation story appears in Genesis 2. Here man is created first and placed in the Garden of Eden to tend it. When God sees that he is lonely all the animals are made as possible companions for him.

Finally the first woman (Eve) is created after Adam rejects all of the animals as partners. Hence, in this account man is created first and woman is created last. These obvious contradictions presented a problem for the ancient rabbis who believed that the Torah was the written word of God and therefore it could not contradict itself. They therefore interpreted Genesis 1 so that it did not contradict Genesis 2, coming up with ideas such as the androgyne and a "First Eve" in the process. According to the theory of a "First Eve," Genesis 1 refers to Adam’s first wife, while Genesis 2 refers to Eve, who was Adam’s second wife. Learn more about the two versions of Creation and how they relate to Lilith in: Where Does the Legend of Lilith Come From? Eventually this idea of a “First Eve” was combined with legends of female “lillu” demons, who were believed to stalk men in their sleep and prey upon women and children.

However, the only explicit reference to a “Lilith” in the Bible appears in Isaiah 34:14, which reads: “The wild cat shall meet with the jackals, and the satyr shall cry to his fellow, yea, Lilith shall repose there and find her a place of rest.” Lilith in the Talmud and in Midrash Lilith is mentioned four times in the Babylonian Talmud, though in each of these cases she is not referred to as Adam’s wife. BT Niddah 24b discusses her in relation to abnormal fetuses and uncleanness, saying: “If an abortion had the likeness of Lilith its mother is unclean by reason of the birth, for it is a child, but it has wings.” Here we learn that the rabbis believed Lilith had wings and that she could influence the outcome of a pregnancy. BT Shabbat 151b also discusses Lilith, warning that a man should not sleep alone in a house lest Lilith fall upon him in his sleep. According to this and other texts, Lilith is a female succubus not unlike the lillu demons referenced above.

The rabbis believed she was responsible for nocturnal emissions while a man was sleeping and that Lilith used the semen she collected to give birth to hundreds of demon babies. Lilith also appears in Baba Batra 73a-b, where a sighting of her son is described, and in Erubin 100b, where the rabbis discuss Lilith’s long hair in relation to Eve. Glimpses of Lilith’s eventual association with the “First Eve” can be seen in Genesis Rabbah 18:4, a collection of midrashim about the book of Genesis. Here the rabbis describe the “First Eve” as a “golden bell” that troubles them in the night. “'A golden bell'… it is she who troubled me all night...Why do not all other dreams exhaust a man, yet this [a dream of intimacy takes place] does exhaust a man. Because from the very beginning of her creation she was but in a dream.” Over the centuries the association between the “First Eve” and Lilith led to Lilith’s assuming the role of Adam’s first wife in Jewish folklore.

Learn more about the development of Lilith’s legend in: Lilith, from the Medieval Period to Modern Feminist Texts. References: Baskin, Judith. "Midrashic Women: Formations of the Feminine in Rabbinic Literature." University Press of New England: Hanover, 2002. Kvam, Krisen E. etal. "Eve & Adam: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Readings on Genesis and Gender." Indiana University Press: Bloomington, 1999. Lilith - Demon and first wife of Adam - YouTube Lilith - Demon and first wife of Adam Want to watch this again later? Sign in to add this video to a playlist. Need to report the video? Sign in to report inappropriate content. The interactive transcript could not be loaded. Loading... Rating is available when the video has been rented. This feature is not available right now. Please try again later. Published on Dec 26, 2012 Band from the Bible, untold story of the Adams first wife.

Category The Haunting World of Jewish Female Demons and Spirits | Broadly The Haunting World of Jewish Female Demons and Spirits Apr 23 2016 1:50 PM Still from "The Possession" Untamed female sex demons, possessive evil spirits, brainless mud men, and even some exorcisms. Who says Jews don't know how to get down with the dark side? In a world of Paranormal Activity, The Witch and the rise of progressive Satanists , where is the love for Jewish possessions, demons, and hauntings? Jewish demons demand respect too. A religion over 3000 years old has compelling stories that take a look at the darker side of Judaism and the entities inhabiting its books. Enter: Lilith. A relief in Babylon, considered to be an early depiction of Lilith According to the Babylonian Talmud , Lilith (which translates to night monster or night scream) was Adam's first wife. Though she was created from the same dirt God used to create Adam, she's said to be made of filth.

(Unlike Eve, who would come later, and was made from Adam's rib.) Adam and Lilith did not get along, largely because Adam was angry that God made him from the dirt as his wife. Lilith was willful and strong-minded. Adam tried his best to make her subservient but Lilith could not tamed. Adam insisted on missionary sex whereas Lilith demanded to be on top. In an utter rage she screamed out, "Yaweh," the sacred name of God, then sprouted wings, rose into the air and flew away. When Adam's next wife, Eve, was created, it's said that God put Adam to sleep so he wouldn't see how she was made. Lilith's legend grew throughout Mesopotamia and it was believed that she that would fly around strangling or kidnapping newborns, possibly preying on pregnant women as well. It was also believed that Lilith could fertilize herself with male sperm to give birth to her own demon babies.

The Babylonian Talmud warns: "It is forbidden for a man to sleep alone in a house, lest Lilith get hold of him." 'Lilith' by John Collier, 1812 For Babylonian Jews of the world, life was filled with spirits and demons that inhabited every facet of the physical world. These spirits were everywhere. Nothing was safe. You couldn't even leave food under your bed without demons infesting it. Typically, they were demons in league with Asmodeus , King of the demons, and his Queen Agrat bat Mahlat , who had 10,000 demon attendants (squad goals, anyone?). The demon queen is considered a sacred angel of prostitution and on the Sabbath she's known to park her chariot and dance on the roofs of Jews. Judaism even also has their own history of demonic possession and exorcism. In Jewish folklore, a dybbuk was an evil spirit that entered a living person, cleaving to his soul and causing mental illness. Souls that had sinned so greatly weren't allowed to transmigrate because they were karet, which means "cut-off by God" in Hebrew.

Jewish exorcisms occurred all the way up to 1904, when Rabbi Ben-Zion Hazzan exorcised a dybbuk out of a woman. A performance of play called The Dybbuk about a Jewish woman's demonic possession. Most rabbis, unless they're ultra-Orthodox or they're in the movie The Possession , seem to be skeptical of demonic possession. "Judaism has a very strong prohibition against any kind of belief in witchcraft and magick and stuff like that," says Rabbi Ron Herstik, a Reform rabbi (and my father). "Every religion has a folk religion, what the common people believe, everyday people, and that's always existed in Judaism. The belief in things unseen, Herstik muses, "has to do with the unconscious workings of the mind, of the things we conjure up." He adds, "as we do that we create forces or we name forces and give voice to forces that we otherwise don't understand.

"Magick is a way of saying there's a force out there that we can use to manipulate nature, to manipulate time, to manipulate fate and people who can do this are talented in some way whether they are witches or warlocks or whatever you want to call them. They are endowed with this power to be able to do that to basically manipulate reality through magick." "You're not supposed to do that because witchcraft implies that there's a power paranormal to God's power or a power that can go behind God that can accomplish ends that human beings want and you're not supposed to screw around with God, basically," Herstik says. In other words playing God, is God's least favorite game. But playing God is just too much fun, especially when you can create a golem, or a body without a soul. The most common way to create a golem is by shaping mud into a man like figure, and using God's name to bring it to life. A golem is created by magic to serve its creator, and even appears in the Bible in Psalms. A famous legend has it that in 1720, Maharal of Prague created a golem to protect the Jewish people from anti-Semitic attacks.

The golem got out of hand and Maharal removed God's name from its forehead, and it returned to dust. 'The Golem' by Warren Chriswell, 1997 Demonesses, demons, evil spirits and soulless bodies inhabit the pages of Jewish legend. And if that isn't enough, the first mention of Satan derives from the Book of Job, translated from the Hebrew word for adversary. Satan who worked as God's roaming ambassador, is the one responsible for taking all of Job's riches and killing all of his family except his wife, in an effort to see if Job will denounce God, which he doesn't. Even though God was the one to order Satan to carry out his will, it's still good old Satan who gets the bad reputation. And although killing off family members is fine with God, practicing witchcraft and conjuring up spirits is still totally not. Topics The Lilith Myth Gnostic Studies on the Web The Lilith Myth Presented here is a chapter discussing Lilith, taken from Hebrew Myths: The Book of Genesis by Robert Graves and Raphael Patai (New York: Doubleday, 1964), pp 65-69.

Graves and Patai have collected traditional Hebrew myths that amplify (and sometimes radically alter) stories found in the Book of Genesis. This chapter, titled "Adam's Helpmeets", deals in part with the Lilith myth. Each section of the chapter excerpted here recounts a "story" collected from non-biblical sources, frequently the Talmud -- sources are footnoted. The footnotes are followed by notes of author commentary. Hebrew Myths is recently back in print in a new hardcover edition -- Buy the Book . (A much more extensive discussion of Lilith is found in the The Hebrew Goddess, also by Rapael Patai. The Hebrew Goddess is in print and is listed next....) The best detailed discussion and historical evaluation of the Lilith myth will be found in The Hebrew Goddess, by Raphael Patai (Wayne State University Press, 3rd edition, 1978). Patai presents an in-depth evaluation of the important but oft ignored role played by the feminine in Hebrew myth and religion, following the story of the Hebrew goddess from antiquity through its manifestations in Kabbalah and in the developing myth of Lilith. We highly recommend this work to those interested in the story of Lilith.

Those interested in the Lilith myth might also find interesting an essay discussing Gnostic creation mythology and the important role played by the feminine in the unique Gnostic reading of the Book of Genesis: The Genesis Factor: Gnostic Creation Mythology . Excerpt from: The Hebrew Myths by Robert Graves and Raphael Patai (New York: Doubleday, 1964), pp 65-69 Chapter 10: Adam's Helpmeets (a) Having decided to give Adam a helpmeet lest he should be alone of his kind, God put him into a deep sleep, removed one of his ribs, formed it into a woman, and closed up the wound, Adam awoke and said: 'This being shall be named "Woman", because she has been taken out o f man. A man and a woman shall be one flesh.' The title he gave her was Eve, 'the Mother of All Living''. [1] (b) Some say that God created man and woman in His own image on the Sixth Day, giving them charge over the world; [2] but that Eve did not yet exist. Now, God had set Adam to name every beast, bird and other living thing.

When they passed before him in pairs, male and female, Adam-being already like a twenty-year-old man-felt jealous of their loves, and though he tried coupling with each female in turn, found no satisfaction in the act. He therefore cried: 'Every creature but I has a proper matel', and prayed God would remedy this injustice. [3] (c) God then formed Lilith, the first woman, just as He had formed Adam, except that He used filth and sediment instead of pure dust. From Adam's union with this demoness, and with another like her named Naamah, Tubal Cain's sister, sprang Asmodeus and innumerable demons that still plague mankind. Many generations later, Lilith and Naamah came to Solomon's judgement seat, disguised as harlots of Jerusalem'. [4] (d) Adam and Lilith never found peace together; for when he wished to lie with her, she took offence at the recumbent posture he demanded. 'Why must I lie beneath you?' she asked.

'I also was made from dust, and am therefore your equal.' Because Adam tried to compel her obedience by force, Lilith, in a rage, uttered the magic name of God, rose into the air and left him. Adam complained to God: 'I have been deserted by my helpmeet' God at once sent the angels Senoy, Sansenoy and Semangelof to fetch Lilith back. They found her beside the Red Sea, a region abounding in lascivious demons, to whom she bore lilim at the rate of more than one hundred a day. 'Return to Adam without delay,' the angels said, `or we will drown you!' Lilith asked: `How can I return to Adam and live like an honest housewife, after my stay beside the Red Sea?? 'It will be death to refuse!' they answered. `How can I die,' Lilith asked again, `when God has ordered me to take charge of all newborn children: boys up to the eighth day of life, that of circumcision; girls up to the twentieth day.

None the less, if ever I see your three names or likenesses displayed in an amulet above a newborn child, I promise to spare it.' To this they agreed; but God punished Lilith by making one hundred of her demon children perish daily; [5] and if she could not destroy a human infant, because of the angelic amulet, she would spitefully turn against her own. [6] (e) Some say that Lilith ruled as queen in Zmargad, and again in Sheba; and was the demoness who destroyed job's sons. [7] Yet she escaped the curse of death which overtook Adam, since they had parted long before the Fall. Lilith and Naamah not only strangle infants but also seduce dreaming men, any one of whom, sleeping alone, may become their victim. [8] (f) Undismayed by His failure to give Adam a suitable helpmeet, God tried again, and let him watch while he built up a woman's anatomy: using bones, tissues, muscles, blood and glandular secretions, then covering the whole with skin and adding tufts of hair in places.

The sight caused Adam such disgust that even when this woman, the First Eve, stood there in her full beauty, he felt an invincible repugnance. God knew that He had failed once more, and took the First Eve away. Where she went, nobody knows for certain. [9] (g) God tried a third time, and acted more circumspectly. Having taken a rib from Adam's side in his sleep, He formed it into a woman; then plaited her hair and adorned her, like a bride, with twenty-four pieces of jewellery, before waking him. Adam was entranced. [10] (h) Some say that God created Eve not from Adam's rib, but from a tail ending in a sting which had been part of his body. God cut this off, and the stump-now a useless coccyx-is still carried by Adam's descendants. [11] (i) Others say that God's original thought had been to create two human beings, male and female; but instead He designed a single one with a male face looking forward, and a female face looking back. Again He changed His mind, removed Adam's backward-looking face, and built a woman's body for it.

[12] (j) Still others hold that Adam was originally created as an androgyne of male and female bodies joined back to back. Since this posture made locomotion difficult, and conversation awkward, God divided the androgyne and gave each half a new rear. These separate beings He placed in Eden, forbidding them to couple. [13] Notes on sources: 7. Targum ad job 1. 15. 8. B. Shabbat 151b; Ginzberg, LJ, V. 147-48. 9. Gen. Rab. 158, 163-64; Mid. Abkir 133, 135; Abot diR. Nathan 24; B. Sanhedrin 39a. 10. Gen. II. 21-22; Gen. Rab. 161. 11. Gen. Rab. 134; B. Erubin 18a. 12. B. Erubin 18a. 13. Gen. Rab. 55; Lev. Rab.

14.1: Abot diR. Nathan 1.8; B. Berakhot 61a; B. Erubin 18a; Tanhuma Tazri'a 1; Yalchut Gen. 20; Tanh. Buber iii.33; Mid. Tehillim 139, 529. Authors� Comments on the Myth: 1. The tradition that man's first sexual intercourse was with animals, not women, may be due to the widely spread practice of bestiality among herdsmen of the Middle East, which is still condoned by custom, although figuring three times in the Pentateuch as a capital crime. In the Akkadian Gilgamesh Epic, Enkidu is said to have lived with gazelles and jostled other wild beasts at the watering place, until civilized by Aruru's priestess. Having enjoyed her embraces for six days and seven nights, he wished to rejoin the wild beasts but, to his surprise, they fled from him.

Enkidu then knew that he had gained understanding, and the priestess said: 'Thou art wise, Enkidu, like unto a godl' 2. Primeval man was held by the Babylonians to have been androgynous. Thus the Gilgamesh Epic gives Enkidu androgynous features: `the hair of his head like a woman's, with locks that sprout like those of Nisaba, the Grain-goddess.' The Hebrew tradition evidently derives from Greek sources, because both terms used in a Tannaitic midrash to describe the bisexual Adam are Greek: androgynos, 'man-woman', and diprosopon, 'twofaced'. Philo of Alexandria, the Hellenistic philosopher and commentator on the Bible, contemporary with Jesus, held that man was at first bisexual; so did the Gnostics. This belief is clearly borrowed from Plato. Yet the myth of two bodies placed back to back may well have been founded on observation of Siamese twins, which are sometimes joined in this awkward manner. The two-faced Adam appears to be a fancy derived from coins or statues of Janus, the Roman New Year god. 3.

Divergences between the Creation myths of Genesis r and n, which allow Lilith to be presumed as Adam's first mate, result from a careless weaving together of an early Judaean and a late priestly tradition. The older version contains the rib incident. Lilith typifies the Anath-worshipping Canaanite women, who were permitted pre-nuptial promiscuity. Time after time the prophets denounced Israelite women for following Canaanite practices; at first, apparently, with the priests' approval-since their habit of dedicating to God the fees thus earned is expressly forbidden in Deuteronomy xxIII. I8. Lilith's flight to the Red Sea recalls the ancient Hebrew view that water attracts demons. 'Tortured and rebellious demons' also found safe harbourage in Egypt. Thus Asmodeus, who had strangled Sarah's first six husbands, fled 'to the uttermost parts of Egypt' (Tobit viii. 3), when Tobias burned the heart and liver of a fish on their wedding night. 4. Lilith's bargain with the angels has its ritual counterpart in an apotropaic rite once performed in many Jewish communities.

To protect the newborn child against Lilith-and especially a male, until he could be permanently safeguarded by circumcision-a ring was drawn with natron, or charcoal, on the wall of the birthroom, and inside it were written the words: 'Adam and Eve. Out, Lilith!' Also the names Senoy, Sansenoy and Semangelof (meanings uncertain) were inscribed on the door. If Lilith nevertheless succeeded in approaching the child and fondling him, he would laugh in his sleep. To avert danger, it was held wise to strike the sleeping child's lips with one finger-whereupon Lilith would vanish. 5. 'Lilith' is usually derived from the Babylonian-Assyrian word lilitu, ,a female demon, or wind-spirit'-one of a triad mentioned in Babylonian spells. But she appears earlier as 'Lillake' on a 2000 B.G. Sumerian tablet from Ur containing the tale of Gilgamesh and the Willow Tree. There she is a demoness dwelling in the trunk of a willow-tree tended by the Goddess Inanna (Anath) on the banks of the Euphrates.

Popular Hebrew etymology seems to have derived 'Lilith' from layil, 'night'; and she therefore often appears as a hairy night-monster, as she also does in Arabian folklore. Solomon suspected the Queen of Sheba of being Lilith, because she had hairy legs. His judgement on the two harlots is recorded in I Kings III. 16 ff. According to Isaiah xxxiv. I4-I5, Lilith dwells among the desolate ruins in the Edomite Desert where satyrs (se'ir), reems, pelicans, owls, jackals, ostriches, arrow-snakes and kites keep her company. 6. Lilith's children are called lilim. In the Targum Yerushalmi, the priestly blessing of Numbers vi. 26 becomes: 'The Lord bless thee in all thy doings, and preserve thee from the Lilim!' The fourth-century A.D. commentator Hieronymus identified Lilith with the Greek Lamia, a Libyan queen deserted by Zeus, whom his wife Hera robbed of her children. She took revenge by robbing other women of theirs. 7.

The Lamiae, who seduced sleeping men, sucked their blood and ate their flesh, as Lilith and her fellow-demonesses did, were also known as Empusae, 'forcers-in'; or Mormolyceia, 'frightening wolves'; and described as 'Children of Hecate'. A Hellenistic relief shows a naked Lamia straddling a traveller asleep on his back. It is characteristic of civilizations where women are treated as chattels that they must adopt the recumbent posture during intercourse, which Lilith refused. That Greek witches who worshipped Hecate favoured the superior posture, we know from Apuleius; and it occurs in early Sumerian representations of the sexual act, though not in the Hittite. Malinowski writes that Melanesian girls ridicule what they call `the missionary position', which demands that they should lie passive and recumbent. 8. Naamah, 'pleasant', is explained as meaning that 'the demoness sang pleasant songs to idols'. Zmargad suggest smaragdos, the semi-precious aquamarine; and may therefore be her submarine dwelling. A demon named Smaragos occurs in the Homeric Epigrams. 9.

Eve's creation by God from Adam's rib-a myth establishing male supremacy and disguising Eve's divinity-lacks parallels in Mediterranean or early Middle-Eastern myth. The story perhaps derives iconotropically from an ancient relief, or painting, which showed the naked Goddess Anath poised in the air, watching her lover Mot murder his twin Aliyan; Mot (mistaken by the mythographer for Yahweh) was driving a curved dagger under Aliyan's fifth rib, not removing a sixth one. The familiar story is helped by a hidden pun on tsela, the Hebrew for 'rib': Eve, though designed to be Adam's helpmeet, proved to be a tsela, a 'stumbling', or 'misfortune'. Eve's formation from Adam's tail is an even more damaging myth; perhaps suggested by the birth of a child with a vestigial tail instead of a coccyx-a not infrequent occurrence. 10. The story of Lilith's escape to the East and of Adam's subsequent marriage to Eve may, however, record an early historical incident: nomad herdsmen, admitted into Lilith's Canaanite queendom as guests (see 16.

1), suddenly seize power and, when the royal household thereupon flees, occupy a second queendom which owes allegiance to the Hittite Goddess Heba. The meaning of 'Eve' is disputed. Hawwah is explained in Genesis III. 20 as 'mother of all living'; but this may well be a Hebraicized form of the divine name Heba, Hebat, Khebat or Khiba. This goddess, wife of the Hittite Storm-god, is shown riding a lion in a rock-sculpture at Hattusaswhich equates her with Anath-and appears as a form of Ishtar in Hurrian texts. She was worshipped at Jerusalem (see 27. 6). Her Greek name was Hebe, Heracles's goddess-wife. -- Hebrew Myths by Robert Graves and Raphael Patai (New York: Doubleday, 1964), pp 65-69. Click here to Buy the Book

Question: Which Jewish female demon was reputedly the first wife of Adam?
Answer: LILITH